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Today I found myself in the wing of the Metropolitan Museum of Art devoted to some of the European Masters. And speaking of Masters, during the 19th Century, artists in Western Europe began to grow out of the Romanticist and Pre-Raphaelite styles of art, and began to take an interest in more exotic topics, locales, and subjects. This style or school came to be called Orientalist Art. Centuries before, when the Moors had made incursions into Spain, they left an architectural and artistic imprint on Spain and by extension, via travelers, the Continent.

With Northern Africa relatively nearby, or even directly nearby, the 19th century artists headed for Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, as well as Libya and Egypt by ship. Those who were less courageous left Europe behind as they made their way overland to Turkey and points further East and South. Terms like casbah, souk, and harem fascinated and thrilled the Western Europeans.

Folks, I too was thrilled when I got my first taste of North African and Arabian culture by means of this Art known as Orientalist. May I share some of my favorites with you? Our first painting is called The Pyramids Road — Giza, and was the work of Edward Lear.

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Have you ever been seduced by something? By an idea, a place, or a desire that was so overpowering that you couldn’t think of anything else. Before you knew what you were doing, you had quit your job, or bought a plane ticket, or one morning, you found yourself in bed with someone, and you aren’t quite sure of how you got there. The odds are that you were lured, or seduced.

In the 1976 film Network, a savage send up of television directed by Sidney Lumet, we are introduced to the head of a news department of a fictional television network. This character, called Max Schumacher, played by William Holden, has to deal with the fact that his news division is struggling with falling ratings.

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Yuri Morisita - Koi Toiki
Idol One - Line Communications

The Skinny: It’s back to Bali for a warm and summery bikini epic only with more than a little bit more edginess than we normally see from Line Communications in their Idol One Series. They call it Koi Toiki. The cover is below.

This is the first of two reviews featuring Ms Yuri Morishita. The other title is Renai Shinwa from Takeshobo. Click the picture (cover below) to go to that review when you are done with this one.

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